Return of the Living Dead: Re-reading Pierre Flourens' Contributions to Neurophysiology and Literature

Historians of neurophysiology remember Marie Jean Pierre Flourens (1794-1867) for his experimental approach to nineteenth-century debates on cortical localization and, in particular, for his successful attacks on Frantz Joseph Gall's (1758-1828) phrenology (Gall and Spurzheim, 1810-19). Whereas Gall and his colleague, Johann Gaspar Spurzheim (1776-1832), posited correlations between features of the skull and brain development and claimed to have localized character traits, competencies and temperaments in specific cortical regions, Flourens advocated cerebral equipotentiality and provided empirical as well as philosophical grounds for his theories. Flourens has also been recognized for his contributions to the understanding of the cerebellum's role in the coordination of movement, the localization of a respiratory center in the medulla oblongata, the relationship between the semicircular canals and balance, the role of the periosteum in bone growth and regeneration, and finally, the anesthetic properties of chloroform. Less known to historians of neuroscience is the fact that Pierre Flourens was not only a neurophysiologist and Secretaire Perpetuel of the French Academie des Sciences, he was also a member of the Academie Francaise, France's most prestigious literary academy. Examining Flourens' contributions as a writer and, at the same time, a prime target for criticism and caricature from journalists, yields a particularly interesting example of the problematic relations between different genres of science writing and their respective publics in mid-nineteenth-century France.